


Siempre El Oro

by SKSuncloud



Category: Figure Skating RPF
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-17
Updated: 2014-02-17
Packaged: 2018-01-12 18:55:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,511
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1195830
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SKSuncloud/pseuds/SKSuncloud
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>First day of training after the Olympics and Javier can't get out of his own head to focus on anything but his Olympic gold medalist training partner.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Siempre El Oro

**Author's Note:**

> I cannot get over the two of them. The more I learn and watch the more I want to write about them and I still don't feel like I'm doing them justice.  
> I mean, they both got into skating because of their older sisters, both eventually came to Canada from countries where their opportunities were limited, so close in age, they don't speak the same native language but they communicate beautifully, bonding over their shared passion, going to competitions together, training under the same coach, Javier was actually excited to have Yuzuru training with him, the skinny Japanese kid and the young Spanish beauty. Like.  
> THIS IS NOT A SHOJO MANGA PLOT THIS IS THE REAL LIFE.  
> THIS IS NOT JUST FANTASY.  
> So I hope to hear considerably more about their relationship in the future. In fact it's the only thing the media should focus on. Gold medal be damned I want to know where the two of them eat dinner together COME ON.

**Siempre El Oro**

 

First day of training for the new season. Javier pulled on his skates and then let his head rest between his knees. His Olympic run had been disappointing. Just a little cleaner. If he’d just put in a slight bit more effort into training maybe he could have joined his friend on the Olympic platform and taken home the bronze for Spain.

That had been his dream, to take home a medal in figure skating for his country, and to be standing alongside Yuzuru doing it. Afterall, Yuzuru was always going to bring home a medal. Ever since the first time he’d seen Yuzuru land a quad he’d known that someday the world would be cheering on his world class victory and that he would be the one to beat--that skinny Japanese boy with the floppy hair.

He ran his fingers through his own hair, growing long again and messy with curls. Brian was walking over and they’d have to go over goals for this season. He’d have some more encouraging words, tell Javier how well he’d done. Fourth place at Sochi was nothing to sneeze at, but it was still fourth place and in the crowd watching Yuzuru smile and bow as he accepted gold.

Yuzuru.

It wasn’t like they hadn’t hung out in Sochi. Yuzuru had been a constant support and companion even though they were skating for separate countries. They hadn’t spent any less time together than they usually did in competition, but it had felt different. It had felt distant. Yuzuru was in a different world already. After the Olympics had ended they’d both taken time off and gone home. This was the first time Javier would see him since.

He’d known Yuzuru was already there as soon as he came in to train because Pooh was sitting on the edge of the rink, ready to dish out tissues at any moment.

He concentrated on the ground while Brian sat down and started talking to him, all technical pointers to begin with, mostly what he needed to focus on to avoid the mistakes that had cost him bronze.

When he looked up, Yuzuru had just finished a warm up routine and was stretching, first arms, then he leaned down and brushed the ice with his fingertips before picking up into skating again. He caught Javier’s eyes and grinned, waving both hands.

Yuzuru’s smile always hit Javier full in the face. He smiled back and waved, both hands in mimic. It would be a while longer before he’d start skating too, he needed to be paying attention to his coach.

Yuzuru did a few laps around the ice, each time he skated close he grinned. After the second lap, Javier tried to avert his eyes again. Yuzuru pulled him in. Every time. He wanted to be out on the ice already. He just wanted to skate and get started and work out the details later. The big picture would come, the minute things would smooth, but the feel of being on the ice would reawaken him. Skating with Yuzuru always did.

When they’d first started training together he thought Yuzuru might be too serious to count on as a friend because he was quiet and his work ethic was far too good for a boy of 17. But as they began to spend more time together during breaks and before and after practice, he realized their sense of humor was exactly the same. As Yuzuru’s English got better and they could understand one another’s jokes more and more, the laughter grew constant. Soon it was like they’d been friends their whole lives. The language didn’t even matter. Javier could speak in Spanish and Yuzuru always seemed to know when to laugh. He was outgoing. He trained harder and longer than Javier had the attention span for, but it was always fun when Yuzuru was there. There was a spark of energy like there was nowhere in the world it would be better to be

Yuzuru stumbled, then fell splat on the ice, limbs sprawled, already laughing to himself all alone out there. Brian called out a technical correction, which Yuzuru waved off, taking his lap again and putting in a jump this time. Brian shook his head and started talking again so Javier had to pull his focus back away from the boy. When Yuzuru fell, he had a tendency to let his whole body give out in a way that never stopped being both comical and weirdly attractive.

There was a time they had been messing around at the end of a particularly light practice, pretending to be an ice dancing pair. Javier had been leading Yuzuru when Yuzuru’s stumbled and fell back, no grace at all, square on his butt, then sprawled out flat. His face had scrunched up and he let out a sharp word that had sent Javier into a fit of giggles as he spread his legs, skated right over the top of him. Yuzuru had grabbed his skate or something because the next thing he knew he was down on the ice as well and they were both laughing and struggling to get up onto their skates while pushing or pulling the other one back down onto the ice. There had been something right then, something outside of the danger of messing around like they were. He caught his breath in a moment when Yuzuru’s face was too close to his. It was something in the way Yuzuru’s torso felt under his hand or the delicacy of his slight hands through his gloves. Maybe it was how laughing with him made the world feel like it was always going to be a safe and wonderful place.

It had made Javier feel so shy for the first time around Yuzuru. When Yuzuru had finally gave in and helped him up, wrapped his arms around his neck—a perfectly normal hug—and they had made their way off the ice, Javier knew there was something else.

It had taken a month or so after they met for Yuzuru to drop formalities around him. Japan was a very formal place compared to Spain and even more compared to Canada. Yuzuru’s English had only been fine, but even though Brian had introduced them by their first names, Yuzuru had asked Javier what he should call him.

“In Japan,” Yuzuru had told him once after finding out Javier’s birthdate, “I would call you my _Senpai_.”

“What would I call you?” he’d asked.

“ _Kohai_. Because I came to train after.” He’d held up a hand at his point and waved it dismissively, “But here, Yuzuru is okay. It’s okay. Do not say that. I will be embarrassed.”

That hadn’t changed the amount of time it took for Yuzuru to stop being flustered when Javier called him “Yuzuru” or to stop sighing and tilting his head in a wince (always with a smile) when Brian insisted on calling him “Yuzu.” Javier never had the nerve to shorten Yuzuru’s name because the grin it caused made his stomach weak. Even after Yuzuru had taken after Brian and started calling him “Javi,” for him it was always “Yuzuru.”

Yuzuru came and waited by the wall for a moment and Brian stood up to answer him. “Go ahead and start warming up,” he said, patting Javier on the back as he stood. Yuzuru asked his question mostly in gestures, cocking his head with a grimace when Brian pointed and answered, copying Yuzuru’s style of gesturing in his response. Javier stood up and slid his skate guards off. Yuzuru waited for him and held up both hands in triumphant fists as he stepped out onto the ice.

“New season!” he said, all toothy grin and held his hands open for high fives. Javier clapped his hands against Yuzuru’s gloves, stitched their fingers together and squeezed.

“Congratulations gold medalist,” he said. He wished he’d remembered the word for it in Japanese.

Yuzuru grinned and ducked his head, then shook their linked hands excitedly. “We are Olympians! This year we will do our best,” Yuzuru said proudly, unlinking his fingers. He reached up and held Javier’s face with both hands, squeezing his cheeks together, then pulling him along for a moment before skating off backward across the ice. Javier started out slowly, then sped up. He still had his warm ups to do. He wanted to ease into this season, find out what Yuzuru was doing, see where his own limitations would be. Maybe he could find the inspiration to challenge himself.

“ _Omedetou_!” he called suddenly, as the word came back to him.

Yuzuru stopped from across the rink and laughed. He saluted, then started off again into his training program. Javier felt himself grinning wildly and sped up to distract himself.

Sometimes people just attracted other people. There didn’t have to be a reason for it. He could just enjoy the way being near the other boy made him feel.

Or maybe there was something.

There had been a moment before the Olympics when they’d been trying on costumes to test them for skating. Yuzuru was trying on a costume designed for him by Johnny Weir. Javier couldn’t say exactly what it was. Obviously it fit him perfectly since it was made for him, but there was something about it. Yuzuru had looked stunning. Not masculine, not cool, but just… stunning.

Javier had had a dream that night. In the dream Yuzuru was wearing that costume. They were both at the Olympic stadium (which, in the dream had looked remarkably identical to the same ice rink they trained at) except they were the only two souls in the entire building and for some reason Yuzuru was speaking to him in fluid Spanish. He was telling him what a great routine he’d just done and how excited he’d been. As Javier stepped off the dream ice, Yuzuru’s hand had touched his cheek and he was drawn toward the boy like gravity. His face was pulled toward Yuzuru’s and their lips had touched. He’d expected to suddenly wake up, but the feeling of Yuzuru’s lips against his had been solid and real. He had reached up and ran his fingers through that remarkably soft hair and pressed his hips forward into Yuzuru’s. Yuzuru had pulled his face away, their noses running alongside one another and now he said something in English. It was something cute, something funny because they’d started laughing, and then Javier was kissing him again and this was when he’d woken up to the sound of his alarm.

In the dream, with that slender body beneath his hands, he thought this could be it: he must be in love. That was the feeling that had lingered when he’d awoken, flustered and heady.

It had been impossible to avoid Yuzuru’s eyes for as many days as the feeling of his tongue in the dream lingered against Javier’s lips. Worse than that, Yuzuru had tuned immediately in to Javier’s aversion to him. He played it cheekier and cheekier, testing Javier’s personal space by leaning his body in close and touching him far more than usual or necessary just to grin or giggle when he jumped and leave Javier’s head reeling again. And he talked more in Javier’s silence. His broken English filled the spaces in which Javier couldn’t bring himself to speak least he say something ridiculous. And the gentle stroke of Yuzuru’s hand on his shoulder or his arms or his legs—all limbs a constant obstruction—filled what the speaking left wanting.

The touching.

When Yuzuru had first come to train his personal space boundaries had been large. Whether it was a cultural thing or not, Javier still wasn’t sure, but Yuzuru hadn’t seemed to be a fan of casual touching. He made minimal displays even in celebration or relief and kept his body mostly to itself.

It was sometime once the laughter had risen to a constant between them that he noticed Yuzuru didn’t mind being close to him. He’d stopped drawing away, started initiating hugs instead of just accepting them or offering a handshake or high five. It had taken nearly a year before he noticed that among the people they saw most often in Canada, he was the one Yuzuru was most likely to initiated contact with at all.

It felt special. That beautiful, dorky, young boy from Japan was only comfortable being close in proximity with him? It felt very special.

And he wished it felt special the way having a best friend did. He wished that a lot. The way it felt that day after training, as he watched Yuzuru shake his fingers through his hair in frustration with himself and wanted to be those hands… it was inappropriate. They were friends as much as they were training partners, and they were rivals foremost. He didn’t have room open in his life to continue crushing on Yuzuru.

He stepped off the ice and sheathed the blades of his skates and Yuzuru came in after him, skates whishing across the ice, touching Javier’s hip with his hand as he stepped out of the rink and balanced himself to sheath his own skates.

“Good practice, you two. Let’s start talking more about programs for this year tomorrow and Javi? Have your goals for this year down for me, okay? So we can talk about that?” Brian said, picking up Pooh by his butt and handing him to Yuzuru. “Also, I thought we were going to retire Pooh-san this year?”

Yuzuru took the tissue cozy reluctantly.

“Pooh-san is too cute to retire. He is good luck for us all,” Javier supplied, smiling. “And Mickey would get lonely.” He only had the Mickey Mouse tissue cozy because of Yuzuru after all.

Yuzuru grinned triumphantly and held up Pooh so the bear’s face was beneath his chin. His eyes got round and his lips pouty. “Too cute to retire,” he said, then held out the bear so its nose nearly touched Brian’s face.

The coach pulled back with a, “Fine but no more making me carry him.”

Yuzuru laughed and kissed the bear on the head. Javier smiled. This was the dynamic he liked, standing up for what was most adorable about Yuzuru, ganging up on their coach.

Unexpectedly, Yuzuru then turned and kissed Javier square on the cheek. The breath froze halfway out Javier’s lungs. He turned just enough to see Yuzuru’s face as he pulled away and it was all triumph, all joy. Those soft, beautiful lips had just touched his face and he couldn’t stop his hand from rising up to touch the spot. He wished he’d shaved this morning. Wished his skin could have been smooth and welcoming.

“This year is going to be gold, all the way,” Yuzuru said, winking, waving one of Pooh’s paws at him, then he heading after the coach back into the locker room.

Javier rocked back against the wall. Gold all the way. Yeah, it certainly felt like that.


End file.
